


Ain't It Hard, Being So Hardcore?

by spf500



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: ended up mostly focusing on margo and quentin tho, or it would be if i werent a coward and didnt know how to write romantic relatonships, sorry eliot i think i wrote you as a bit of an idiot, uhhh this is basically a marqueliot fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-26
Updated: 2018-12-26
Packaged: 2019-09-27 17:56:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17166608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spf500/pseuds/spf500
Summary: Margo Hanson never meant for her best friends/platonic soulmates/partners to be two dumbasses, but that's where she ended up anyways.





	Ain't It Hard, Being So Hardcore?

**Author's Note:**

> Margo Hanson is my OTB (One True Babe) and deserves more love, backstory, screentime with quentin, etc. etc.
> 
> Title from "Shallow" by Lady Gaga.

Margo knew she gave off an aura of “stone-cold bitch,” and that was exactly how she liked it. Mostly, that was just who she was- she had never been one for tact or not speaking her mind. She knew what she wanted in life and went after it with single-minded purpose, and that was a _strength_ , not a flaw, goddamnit. Margo Hanson was goal-oriented and here to fucking crush it. She was done with smoothing her edges, cutting off bits of herself, just to make others comfortable. And the rest of it— well, there was power in controlling how other people reacted to you. She was more interested in allies and useful connections than friends. Loving relationships? Who needed those? Not this bitch. This bitch knew that was a lie made up by the Disney channel, and she was gonna stick it to the goddamn man by NEVER having a fulfilling relationship EVER. But, like, in an empowered way.

At least, that was what she told herself to get her through the day.

But then she learned about magic, and got into Brakebills, and it was like finally being able to breathe. Like stepping out of Plato’s goddamn cave. And then she met Eliot and- well, if asked, Margo would never admit she believed in soulmates, but. She could be herself around him, just like he could around her. He had known who she was since the day they met, and he had liked what he saw. _She_ liked what she saw in herself when they were together.

Ergo, Margo was not thrilled that Eliot had decided that some first year was going to be part of their exclusive set. But Eliot wouldn’t shut up about him, so in the name of friendship she decided to give him a chance.

…………………..

 

Quentin Coldwater, it turned out, looked exactly like his name suggested. He dressed like someone who thought of clothes as a necessity, if he thought about them at all. He was perpetually hunched over, as if he were trying to disappear into himself, and he looked like he would probably fall over if you breathed too hard in his direction. Margo was by and large not impressed, until he said that he was afraid this whole thing would turn out to be a dream or hallucination, and that at any minute Ember and Umber would show up to kick him out of Fillory. Metaphorically speaking. Um, uh, that was a reference to the Fillory and Furth-

“Hey, I read all the Fillory and Further books, you don’t need to mansplain it to me,” Margo cut in.

“Oh, uh, sorry, right! I’m not, not used to most people getting my references, except for my one friend Julia,” he babbled anxiously. He looked so adorably tense and scrunched up, Margo suddenly wanted to give him a hug, tell him to make better life choices, and maybe force feed him some xanax. She understood now why Eliot liked him: he was a puppy in human form. Margo immediately decided he was her new emotional support person.

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” she waved away his protestations magnanimously. “I know it’s a social ill that few men can avoid.”

“Yeah,” he caught his breath, and smiled wryly, “fuck social diseases.”

…………………..

 

“Well, Bambi, what do we think? Do we keep him?”

“Mmmm,” she grunted non-committedly. “Quentin? He’s a depressed nerd with lower self-esteem than your average chick flick protag, and overall twitchy weirdo.”

“Gee, don’t go too easy on him just because I like him.” Eliot sat back in his chair, crossing his arms. He tried not to show it, but he actually looked _disappointed_ that she didn’t immediately love this stray of his.

“Ah-ah,” she held up a finger, “I’m not finished. As I was saying, he is an all-around unimpressive baby magician dressed by a blind nun. However,” here she softened, smiling just a little, “even though all evidence would point to the contrary, I like having him around. The boy has a certain endearing quality. Anyways, it’ll be good to have a tie-breaker around, and we know he’ll always side with me.”

“What? Why?” demanded Eliot, sitting up quickly with an offended look.

“Because darling,” she flashed her best shark grin, “the boy’s terrified of me.”

…………………..

 

One day, out of sheer boredom, the three of them decided to play a drinking game with one of those shitty 90’s trivial pursuit games that can be found inexplicably in every diner across America. They were deep into their third bottle of cheap wine when Eliot picked up a card and read out:

“Animorphs refers to a) a Canadian TV show b) A line of costumes for pets or c) A type of Power Ranger action figure.” Frowning, he looked at the other two. “Wait, aren’t Animorphs those guys from Harry Potter?”

“Animagus! You’re thinking of Animagi!” Quentin spluttered, a look of abject horror on his face. A jolt of fondness went through Margo.

 “Jesus El, how many times do I have to tell you to read those books? Animorphs”— Margo said this slowly, as Eliot clearly could not be trusted to retain important pop culture references— “was a series of sci-fi books about a group of kids who gain the power to turn into animals and are forced to fight in an intergalactic war. Animagus is the term for a wizard who can turn into one and only one animal.” Margo rolled her eyes at Quentin. “Thank fuck I finally know someone who understands these things.”

Quentin looked at Margo with something new in his eyes- a newfound look of appreciation, like a traveler in a foreign land that had just met someone who spoke his native tongue. Margo liked that look, she decided.

“What?” said Eliot defensively. “I was close enough.”

Margo and Quentin shared an exasperated glance. “No, you really weren’t,” said Quentin.

In that moment some tiny, alchemical transformation occurred, and she and Quentin became friends.

…………………..

 

The trials, of course, were what cemented her and Eliot’s friendship. It took them nearly all night, several bottles of very expensive alcohol, and spilling various secrets such as: Eliot had had an anime phase, Margo was only attracted to mediocre white dudes and deeply ashamed of that, the fact that Eliot had grown up on a farm in Indiana, that Margo was terrified she would never be what her parents wanted her to be. Both of them, out of necessity, had become experts at holding others at arms-length, at burying their “highest guiding principles” under layers and layers of affect and over-the-top statements. It was a hard habit to break, but finally:

              “I killed someone.” Eliot stated this flatly, staring up into the sky. “I- I saw this boy, Logan. He bullied me in school. And there was-there was this bus. And I just thought about it! I swear! But the bus hit him. He died instantly. That’s how I learned I’m telekinetic.” He took a deep, shaky breath. Margo gently bumped her shoulder against his, whispered, “oh baby…”

“That’s it. That’s my ‘highest internal circumstance’ or whatever bullshit this is. Why is the rope still tied?” He was so frustrated (and drunk) he was on the verge of tears— or at least that’s what Margo told herself, out of courtesy.

              “Maybe...maybe you have to be more literal? Maybe, you need it to spell it out, for the spell.” She giggled, muttering “spell it out for the spell” under her breath. God, she was so drunk.

              “Okay, fine. This spell is a shitty excuse for a therapist, by the way. Highest truth, go: I’m afraid that at the core of my being that’s all I am. Someone who destroys the others around him. That I’m a, a killer.” His voice shook. Margo didn’t know what to say to that. She looked at him, searching his face for a hint of what kind of comfort he needed. She found nothing and dropped her gaze to her feet.

              “I’m…I’m afraid that I’ll never be able to love someone. That I’m just frozen inside.” Except, that wasn’t right, was it? “Or, wait, or maybe, I think, I’m terrified to let myself love someone, because what if they don’t love me? God, what if I will never be enough to be loved? What if I’m just a broken, shitty excuse for a human?” Margo felt something on her cheek—she was crying. Eliot looked at her, completely serious and no longer drunk.

              “You’re enough for me, Bambi. And I’m just as broken as you are.” 

The ropes had fallen off long ago but neither of them had noticed, and by the time the conversation was over they were too busy with the existential horror of transforming into geese to notice anything else.

…………………..

 

In the middle of her second year, during the “Christmas” break that actually happened in February, the three of them went to Quentin’s house. This was mostly because Margo and Eliot had nowhere else to go and, well, Q wanted to check up on his dad and the other two didn’t want him to go alone. They were there for moral support, or whatever. Also, wifi. (“Fuck whoever decided magic doesn’t mix well with technology. I’ve gotten better wifi in public bathrooms in France than at Brakebills, and the French barely even know what ‘streaming’ is,” Margo often complained. She had been on the verge of becoming an Instagram influencer before Brakebills, and she would never forgive them that loss.)

The trip quickly devolved into a Harry Potter marathon, because Eliot needed to be properly educated, after all. Eliot also needed to pay fucking attention. (Eliot was, by any measurement known to man, the worst movie watcher on the planet. Somehow, he just could not manage to wrap his head around things like plot, or basic dialogue, and would ask the most infuriatingly stupid goddamn questions that made Margo want to hit him over the head with a pillow. Things like, “Wait, if it’s a tri-wizard tournament, why are there four people in it?” and “Why would that dude even want Lord Vadermort on the back of his head?” Honest to god sometimes she thought he did this just to annoy her.)

Ten minutes into the third movie, Eliot attempted to get up on the pretext of needing the bathroom, even though everyone in the room knew he had gone to the bathroom not fifteen minutes ago.

              “El, sit your ass back down! We are watching these movies for _your_ benefit. Quentin, grab his leg.” She commanded. Quentin, that loveable pushover, did exactly as asked and forced Eliot to sit back down.

              “But Bambi, I’m bored, I just wanna get my phone-” whined Eliot.

              “Too bad. You can check your grindr AFTER we’ve finished this movie.”

              “Anyways- look, we’re just getting to the good part!” added Quentin. “Really, um, the third movie is absolut- is really just the best of them all, artistically speaking.”

              “Oh, well if it’s ARTISTIC-” here Eliot made a desperate lunge to get up off the couch again. Quentin, showing more forethought than she expected, swung his legs up over Eliot’s lap.

              “Nice try.” Quentin looked up at Eliot with a shit-eating grin. She high-fived him over Eliot’s trapped body.

              “But you’re not getting away that easily.” Margo sat back against Eliot, half-pinning him to the couch with her weight.

              “You’re just going to have to stay here, with us.”

              “Well, when you put it like that,” said Eliot, with a wry twist to his mouth. But Margo didn’t miss it when he sighed contentedly and leaned back into the couch, settling in, one hand resting on Quentin’s ankle and another going to the top of her head. They spent the rest of the afternoon like that, all tangled up together, dozing in and out to the sounds of Hogwarts.

…………………..

 

              With three people, suddenly the unstable-co-dependent-and-at-times-claustrophobically-close relationship she had with Eliot stabilized. (Not that she didn’t love that; but it wasn’t sustainable and they both knew it. They were too similar sometimes, egging each other on and devolving into screaming arguments, a feedback loop of bad decisions and denial.) With Quentin, they could relax a little, be a bit more vulnerable. It was hard to have a constant “who can be the most extra” one-upmanship when Quentin was there, ready to laugh at them both. And it was so easy to be just a little more vulnerablewith someone who wore his heart on his sleeve like that. With three it was so much easier to take care of each other. Margo and Quentin would find ways to make sure Eliot ate actual meals that weren’t just a swig from his flask. Quentin and Eliot kept Margo from going too far when she was in a mood (which was often.) And she and Eliot fussed over Quentin on his bad days, both secretly glad for the excuse to exercise their maternal instincts. It was…it was nice. It was comfortable and felt like home in ways Margo was too scared to analyze further. But then, of course, Eliot had to go and fall in love with some sleazy alum.

…………………..

 

Margo was seething with fury. (She liked to consider this a bit of a personal specialty.) She and Eliot were SUPPOSED to be co-hosting a party, but instead he was too absorbed with ~Mike~ to be much of a help, or to even talk to her. In fact, she had basically given up on the party, her mood ruined. She stomped upstairs, determined to get Quentin out of his room. If she was suffering, he would have to too, she thought, marching open his door. “Hey, Q, stop being such a sadsack and get downstairs.” Quentin looked up from his bed, where he was reading. “But, uh- I’m, uh, re-“

“Don’t care. God, what are you going to tell your hypothetical future children, ‘yeah, I don’t have any cool stories from grad school because I was too busy being boring the whole time?’” Margo was angry—worse, she was hurt, and she was being extra cruel to deal with it. “Eliot’s too busy staring lovingly into Mike’s eyes, I need you to come downstairs to help me save this party from itself.” She leaned against the door, arms crossed.

“Um, well, why…why do you want my help?”

“Because if I have to watch Eliot do his sickening lovestruck puppy act for another fucking minute I WILL be digging my own eyes out and that would COMPLETELY ruin these fake eyelashes!” Here she flopped down on his bed. Quentin scooched over to make room for her.

“Wait, fake eyelash-?? You know what, never mind.” He took a minute to stare off into the distance in bafflement, contemplating the mysteries of cosmetics. God, she missed Eliot.

“He’s not ignoring you, you know.” Margo looked up in shock- she hadn’t expected Quentin to pick up on the reasons behind her shitfit so quickly. He had an unusually knowing look on his face. Margo wanted to slap the smug motherfucker.

“I know,” she huffed in frustration. “But I just don’t get it! Mike’s so...bland. Not at all our usual type.” She didn’t say, “every time I look at the two of them together I want to throw up in jealousy or anger or abandonment.” She didn’t say, “I think of love as a finite resource and therefore if Eliot loves Mike he will have less love for me.” (but she thought maybe Quentin knew some of it anyways.)

“Do you, uh, do you want to talk about it?”

“Absolutely not.” Margo was fully prepared to literally go niffin to avoid talking about her feelings. Then, seeing the injured look on his face, she sighed. “Maybe. Later. What book are you reading?”

“Oh, uh, The Wandering Dune! It’s the one where, um Jane goes to Fillory with Helen and-“

“They spend ages on the dune, I remember. I know these books almost as well as you do, dumbass, you know that.” She sniped, but without any real heat. Suddenly she was very, very tired. “Read to me.”

“What?”

“Did I stutter? C’mon Coldwater, read out loud to me! You know you secretly love it.”

“Alright, sure,” he laughed, shaking his head. (She still marveled at her luck, finding this strange, nervous boy who could take all her shit in stride.) “Jane and Helen then came upon the spot where the desert began. Helen had traveled far and wide throughout Fillory yet had never seen anything the likes of this before. In true Fillorian fashion, the spot where the desert began was as clear as a line, instead of a gradual transit-“

Margo let herself drift off, losing herself in the comfort of familiar old words.

…………………..

 

              Things only got worse from there.

…………………..

 

“You know, I've never loved something like that.

 She half-whispered to the mattress, curling in on herself and that sucking void in her stomach. Not thinking about the burning crushing gasping-for-air feeling of swallowing back her feelings, or the Beast, or Eliot slowly spiraling into self-destruction and refusing to talk about it and jesus fuck get a goddamn _grip_ Hanson.

“That’s not true.

He was right, a small part of her whispered, gesticulating wildly at the two other people in bed with her. And that, she thought, terrified her even more— so she turned around and kissed him, consequences be damned.

…………………..

              Afterwards, she was more scared than she had ever been before. The Beast still wasn’t real to her, but this, _this_? The possibility that she had ruined the two relationships that meant the most to her in the world? The idea that they might never be okay again and it was _all her fault?_ Even worse, she actually felt _bad_ that she’d messed up Q’s relationship with his precious little Alice— not because she particularly cared about Alice, but because she hated the idea that she had hurt him. And Eliot, Eliot still wasn’t talking, not in any meaningful way, still wasn’t looking at her. The overwhelming horror of it threatened to choke her, cave her chest in, and that terror turned into anger. She wasn’t supposed to care about other people like that! Her whole world was falling apart and this was _exactly_ what she had dedicated her whole life to avoiding. How dare they! How dare they have made her think that maybe they could face all their problems ~together~ and that as long as they had ~love~ and ~each other~ things would be okay! She let herself be carried away on that feeling, let it manifest itself in crossing the line from bitchy to downright cruel. _I CARE ABOUT YOU_ she wanted to scream at them. But she couldn’t, couldn’t let the world see her lose control. So instead she sniped and critiqued and watched herself slowly sabotage everything she had worked so hard to build up. And then that afternoon she bought herself a gun, because if she didn’t get to kill these dumbasses, she sure as fuck wasn’t going to let anyone else do it.

…………………..

 

              Honestly, she could not believe what absolute idealistic pussies all her friends were. Thank fuck they had her, her and her practical goddamn GROUNDED magenta wool coat and matching gun.

…………………..

 

              Margo really, truly, wanted to have a heart-to-heart with Eliot, but between almost dying together (twice), failing to defeat the Beast, entering into an arranged marriage trapping one of them on Fillory, Alice’s death, Julia’s absolute batshit life choices, etc. etc. they hadn’t had much time to hash out their issues.

And then Eliot and Quentin almost died in quick succession, through idiocy and low-key death wishes. She had never felt so betrayed in her life. And Margo had no choice but to soldier on, trying desperately to keep an entire kingdom from falling apart. A kingdom that wasn’t even hers! Who did she think she was, laying claim to a crown she had no more right to than, than Todd? This caring about things was bullshit. You cared and then your heart was broken and suddenly you were responsible for a hysterical pregnant woman and your closest friend left was a psychopathic sloth.  

…………………..

 

              Then they both lived, which wasn’t necessarily better.

…………………..

 

              “BAAAAMBI!” For the fifth time that _hour_ came Eliot’s cry from somewhere in the depths of the castle, muffled by the yards of silk brocade surrounding him. “SHOULD THE AMBASSADORS FOR THE TALKING ANIMALS BE SEATED ABOVE OR BELOW THE LESSER FAIRY NOBLES.”

              “FUCK IF I KNOW,” she hollered back. “ASK YOUR WIFE.”

              “OKAY I’LL DO THAT BUT COULD YOU COME HERE ANYWAYS I NEED YOUR HELP WITH THE COLOR PALETTE.”

“Fucking Christ,” she grumbled darkly. “I’m gonna murder Eliot, take his crown, and ban all weddings.”

“WHAT.” She wrenched open the door to the throne room. “The FUCK.” She stomped over to Eliot’s table. “Do you WANT.” She placed her hands on her hips, doing her best to dramatically pause at every opportunity. Quentin, who was huddling in a chair, looked up in alarm, a question already forming on his lips. Eliot simply smiled and said,

“Oh, good, take a look at these samples for the table linens. Which do you think says ‘absolutely banging party, but in like, a refined way’ better: the macaroon cream or the scotch mist.” He brandished two swatches of what appeared to be slightly different shades of white in her face.

“Eliot, those look exactly the fucking same. Why do you keep dragging me over here to help you with such stupid questions?”

“Because Q is useless with this kinda stuff.”

“Hey!” yelped Quentin.

“Sorry, but it’s true. Besides, I’m finally getting my shot at happiness in Fillory. I really like Idri, and I want this to go well, and I want my best friend to be involved.” Eliot reached out to take Margo’s hands, but she yanked hers back. The minute she heard “finally getting my shot at happiness,” her blood boiled. Oh? You get to be happy, motherfucker? What about me?

“Whatever.”

“Look, is there a reason you’ve been stomping around Whitespire like it was personally responsible for the death of Prince, or should I just chalk this up to ‘female problems’?”

“God, like you give a FUCK what I’m feeling.”

              The mood instantly dropped. Eliot lowered his hands, looking wounded and angry.

              “Is there something you want to say, Bambi?”

The words she had been chewing on for weeks finally came tumbling out.

“Yes! There is! I want to say FUCK YOU to the pair of you for almost dying for the STUPIDEST FUCKING REASONS. FUCK YOU for putting me through hell, TWICE. Jesus, I know you’re both into that martyr shit, but dying doesn’t fix anything! And maybe you two would have realized that other people care about you if you weren’t so FAR up EACH OTHER’S ASSES. If you had died, I would have fucking killed you for abandoning me like that.” And with that she turned sharply on her heel and stomped out of the room, skirts swishing, leaving behind a general air of shock and confusion.

…………………..

 

Margo slammed into her room and immediately face planted onto her bed, fancy clothes and crown be damned. She was going to have a good, long sulk. In as dramatic a fashion as possible. She thought she deserved it, since everyone else had already had one.

After maybe an hour there was a hesitant knock on her door, then the sound of two people walking in.

“Fucking took you long enough,” she grumbled into her pillow.

“Had to make a pit stop to find these.” Eliot’s pale hand shoved a box of her favorite chocolates into her line of sight. “You’ll have to sit up to eat them, though.”

“Fuck you. I’m high motherfucking queen, a liberated woman, and a magician. I can eat chocolate in any position I want.” Just to prove her point, she grabbed two chocolates, popped them in her mouth, and proceeded to eat them with her head shoved into her pillow.

“I think you’ll, uh, suffocate if you do that,” stuttered Quentin’s voice.

“Fuck you too, coldwater!!”

“Look, Margo, I’m all for women’s lib, but could you please sit up? I’m trying to apologize, and I’d rather not do it to your ass, as cute as it is.”

Margo grudgingly sat up. Eliot was looking at her with an air of real upset, and Quentin’s gaze was surprisingly tender.

“Oh, sit down, before my vertebrae pop out of my neck,” she snapped. Eliot draped himself over one side of her with a thin veneer of elegant insouciance covering relief, while Quentin quickly sat down at the foot of the bed with a faux-alarmed look that betrayed affection.

              “You know we didn’t want to abandon you,” Quentin half-whispered.

              “I know,” she sighed. “Just- it almost killed me, thinking Eliot had died. And then finding out that you had too, Q, for even dumber reasons- well. I was just getting used to you two. As you may have noticed, I am not the most open and loving person-” (here Eliot stifled a snort of laughter. Margo kicked him and continued in a dignified manner.) “And, um, letting people in, well. It’s hard. And then they almost die, so, fuck that.”

              Quentin looked up at her, with almost painful understanding in his eyes. “God, I know. But isn’t it- or, I think, at least, my life is better having the possibility of, of happiness and love, even if it is painful sometimes. You can’t have one without the other, but if you try to shut out the pain, you just end up numb and lonely and with no chance of happiness.”

Fucking philosophy majors. She maybe, might have teared up a little here. Hey, a bitch has got a breaking point.

              “Hey. Hey, Bambi.” Eliot gently touched her cheek, making her meet his eyes. “My life would be so much worse without you in it. Don’t think for a minute that I would leave you, not for all the in-fighting and near-death experiences in the world.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. Margo took a deep breath.

              “I really do love you two. I know I don’t say mushy crap like this- but at the rate we’re going, none of us are gonna make it out of this month alive, much less into old age. So I want to make sure you know. And this is the only time I’m gonna say it, and if you ever bring this up in public I will cut your balls off. But in a loving manner.” She paused for a beat.

“I need you two assholes.”

“Aww, Margo, you love us,” crooned Eliot, dropping an arm over her shoulder, trying (mostly successfully) to cover up his own love.

“Shove it, Eliot.” But she was grinning as she grabbed her pillow and whacked him in the face with it.

“Oh, this is war, bitch!” He scrambled for a pillow, limbs akimbo, knocking Quentin off the bed in the process. “Quentin, help me!”

“Hey, leave me out of this!”

“Too late, bitch!” Crowed Margo as she leaped up to whack Quentin. “Nobody’s safe now!”

“Ow. Ow!”

“C’mon Q, fight back!” Eliot grabbed a pillow and tossed it at Quentin, who immediately fumbled the catch, tripped, and fell onto Margo, who fell back onto Eliot, until they were all a tangled mess on Margo’s bed, faces flushed and chests heaving with laughter.

…………………..

 

Maybe Quentin had a point, she would think later.  Everything good in her life had happened when she had opened herself up to pain, yes, but also to joy, love, all that poetic shit.

She could live like this.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic ever! pls be kind
> 
> Tbh I don't think shallow is a particularly Margo song, but those lyrics have been rattling around my head for months now. Really, I think she's more of a Marina and the Diamonds kinda girl.


End file.
